Oil companies conduct seismic surveying to lower risk and to reduce costs of locating and developing new oil and gas reserves. Seismic surveying is, therefore, an up-front cost with intangible return value. Consequently, minimizing the cost of seismic surveying and obtaining quality results in minimum time are important aspects of the seismic surveying process.
Seismic surveys are conducted by deploying a large array of seismic sensors over a terrain of interest. These arrays may cover over 50 square miles and may include 2000 to 5000 seismic sensors. An energy source such as buried dynamite may be discharged within the array to impart a shockwave into the earth. The resulting shock wave is an acoustic wave that propagates through the subsurface structures of the earth. A portion of the wave is reflected after encountering underground discontinuities, such as oil and gas reservoirs. These reflections are then sensed at the surface by the sensor array and recorded as seismic data. Such sensing and recording are referred to herein as seismic data acquisition. This seismic data is then processed to generate a three dimensional map, or seismic image, of the subsurface structures. The map may be used to make decisions about drilling locations, reservoir size and pay zone depth.
Seismic data acquisition systems may include a relatively large number of seismic data acquisition units. These seismic data acquisition units may need to be configured in a particular manner in order to properly acquire seismic data. The present disclosure addresses the need for in-field configuration of seismic data acquisition units.